Show the Fire

by Susan Fanetti

  He left the barn and closed the door, headed toward his little old Airstream. He got about halfway between the barn and the trailer when he realized he needed to call Tasha and apologize. He got three more steps, pulling out his phone, when he realized that wasn’t what he wanted to do.

  He put his phone back in his pocket and turned toward his truck.

  ~oOo~

  He could hear raucous laughter coming through Tasha’s heavy steel door. He hesitated, feeling jealous and angry and hurt and lonely and…shit.

  Around the time he was supposed to have arrived, she’d texted him three times and called once. Nothing after that—but he hadn’t taken that amiss. She was club. He figured she’d known he was hung up. And they hadn’t come out with what was going on between them, so he hadn’t expected her to call any of his brothers. She knew what discretion was, and she knew that, as far as the club was concerned, she had no place yet checking up on him.

  But to hear those jolly sounds, when his night had been such shit? It hurt. He was shocked by how much.

  He grabbed the handle and rolled the door open. He’d known it would be unlocked; Tasha almost never locked her door when she was home. It drove him nuts, in fact. She lived in a crappy area, and she was a beautiful, affluent woman who lived alone. And she was a known associate of the Horde. The list of things that could go very wrong was very long. And once she was known to be personally connected to him? Well, then he’d fucking force the point.

  He went in. Music was playing and people were laughing and talking—almost yelling, really, in the way people did when they were in a group and having fun. It was a party. And fuck, he felt lonely. A man who preferred his own company could still feel lonely. But this felt deeper. He felt isolated. He felt lonesome.

  As he came into the main space, he saw a group of people, Nadia and Tasha among them, sitting around the low table in front of Tasha’s sofa. They were playing a game. The leavings of a big meal were scattered over the kitchen and the dining table. Several empty bottles were scattered around, too.

  Nadia saw him first. “Biker Dude!” she yelled and bounced up.

  Tasha, who’d been sitting alone in her square, white leather chair, stood and turned immediately. Her initial expression seemed more subdued than the atmosphere of the room would have suggested. Then she smiled and came toward him. As she got closer, her expression changed again.

  “God, Len! What happened? You look—God. Come here.” She took his hand and led him into the kitchen, pushing him to sit on the tall, brushed-steel stool she kept near the counter.

  The room had gone quiet; even the music had been turned off. Len looked over to see that everybody was staring. And Tasha was pulling a kit out from a low cabinet. First aid.

  Len had forgotten about his head. He hadn’t seen a mirror, but he knew his t-shirt was stiff with blood. Fuck. How stupid was that, coming in here looking like who knew what.

  And he still hadn’t spoken. He guessed he’d maybe spoken twenty words since Seaver had pulled them over. His words seemed locked down.

  “Take your kutte and shirt off, babe.” He did what she said. As he was folding his kutte, Tasha looked over to her friends. “Guys, I need you to take off. We’ll do the meet and greet thing another time, okay?”

  They all stood, gathering up their empty plates and glasses. Len pulled his shirt off, wincing as the fabric dragged across his scalp. The whole neck and several inches down the back was the deep, dark red of dried blood. He expected his skin didn’t look much better.

  As her friends piled dishes on the counter, eyeing him with interest, he returned their looks, sizing them up, as well. The women, three of them, including Nadia, were hot. One very tall, slender woman with long, brown hair. Another, with shoulder-length, reddish hair, was curvy and sexy in that old-fashioned way. And then there was Nadia, the goth pixie. Any and all of them were entirely fuckable, were Len in that mood. He was not. But he certainly understood Tasha’s attraction.

  The two men were another story. One was young, early twenties, and slight, and clearly gay. He had a way of moving that made Len sure of it. The other guy was probably forty. He was fat and soft and just…Len didn’t get it. But he could tell that Tasha fucked this guy. When he’d brought his stack of glasses and plates into the kitchen, he’d set it down and then come to Tasha, putting his hand on her back in a way Len thought of as proprietary. He’d held out his other hand to Len as if to shake.

  “I’m Carter. I’m sorry we didn’t get a chance tonight to truly meet.”

  Len stared at that outstretched hand. If Tasha thought she was ever getting him into the same bed with this son of a bitch, then they needed to have a conversation. Because no fucking way was that going to happen.

  Carter dropped his hand and cleared his throat. “Yes. Well. Good night, then.” His hand still on Tasha’s back, he kissed her cheek. Then he left the kitchen, heading toward the blue door.

  Nadia was the last to leave. When she was alone with them, she came over to Len and looked him dead in the eye, an impish grin on her little mouth. Her Monroe piercing sparkled in the overhead lights. “Okay. Now you’ve got some tough guy cred. Way to make an entrance, dude.” Then she kissed his cheek, kissed Tasha’s cheek, and bounced away.

  By the time all of her friends left, Tasha had washed the blood from his head, neck, and back. As she stood behind him, dabbing a swab soaked in what felt like some kind of corrosive acid into the wound, she asked, “Can I ask?”

  “Nah. Just some bullshit. Sorry I missed the party—or fucked it up, or whatever I did. Shoulda stayed home.”

  “No. I’m glad you didn’t. I was worried. I knew something bad had happened.” She dropped the bloody swabs on a swatch of gauze she’d laid out on the concrete countertop. “I should suture this, Len. It’s pretty deep. That’s why all the blood.”

  “Yeah. Go for it. Wouldn’t mind some whiskey, though.”

  “Sure.” She crossed to the end of the room and opened a red cabinet. Pulling an unopened bottle of Jameson out, she asked, “You need a glass?”

  “Bottle’s fine.”

  He needed five long pulls from the bottle to get through the stitches—that son of a bitch had really cracked him one.

  After she finished, she taped gauze over it, and then she shone a penlight into his eyes and studied him carefully. “How’s your head?”

  “Feels like somebody’s been stickin’ a needle in it over and over.”

  “Haha. I’m serious. Do you feel sick? Blurred vision? Neck pain?”

  He put the bottle down and pulled her between his legs. “I’m okay, Doc. Thanks for patchin’ me up. Didn’t mean to come in like that. I just needed to see you.”

  He slid his hands around her hips to her ass and brought her closer. But she put her hand on his shoulder and held herself off.

  “I should put you to bed so you can rest. I’m pretty sure you have a mild concussion.”

  “I feel okay now. And I don’t want to rest.” In reality, he was fucking exhausted, and his head ached like a bitch. But he needed something more than sleep. He needed her. He needed to feel her. To feel her needing him. Wanting him.

  She was wearing a blue silk blouse with little blue silk-covered buttons. He let go of her ass and worked his big, rough fingers over those little buttons. It was slow going, but she stood still and let him do it. Watched him do it, her chest rising and falling heavily.

  “I had such a fucking shitty night. But then I knew if I could get to you, I’d feel better. I knew being with you would make it better.” He’d undone about half the buttons; under her blouse she was wearing a bra in lace almost the exact same color of blue. Cobalt. “But then all those people were here, and it made me feel wrong. Lonesome.”

  He didn’t know why he was talking, but he didn’t think he could stop. Maybe it was the combination of whiskey and concussion—Jameson was probably not an FDA approved treatment for concussion, come to think of it. “I just wanted to have you t
o myself. I just need you for myself. I need you to be mine. Just mine.”

  He got to the bottom of her shirt, but when he moved to push it off her shoulders, she put her hands over his, stopping him. “Len…”

  In that one syllable, Len heard reserve in her voice, concern that he was going somewhere she didn’t want him to. He hated it. But he didn’t like what was going on in his own head, either. He was pushing her too hard; he knew it, but couldn’t shut up. “Tasha. Baby, I need…I need…”

  She dropped her hands from his and shrugged out of her blouse. “You need to stop talking now.” She held his face in her hands and kissed him, bringing her body tightly to his. He crossed his arms over her back, pushing his fingers into her hair, and took control of the kiss, holding her head firmly to his, searching the satiny depths of her mouth with his tongue.

  She broke away with a gasp, and he looked into her amber eyes, with rays of green, gold, and brown around her pupils. Her eyes were fucking amazing; he wasn’t sure he’d fully appreciated their unique color before.

  “I need you, Doc.”

  She stepped out of the circle of his body and took his hand. “Shut up. Come to bed.”

  Leading him by the hand, she brought him to the side of the bed. There, she opened his belt and jeans and pushed her hand under the denim. He rested his hands on her shoulders and toed off his boots. Then she pushed his jeans down, squatting before him, pushing her fingers into his socks so that they came off, too.

  She rolled down to her knees and looked up at him, dressed in her blue lace bra and a pair of black pants with legs so wide they almost made a skirt, her fiery hair loose over her back, covering her fairy wings. She was an angel. His angel.

  He was so hard he hurt. When she wrapped a slender, soft hand around his cock, his knees almost buckled.

  “You should rest, Len. What I should do right now is tuck you in and keep an eye on you.”

  Fuck, the sight of her on her knees before him, her hand circling his shaft, her mouth so close he could feel her breath on him. “I’m okay, Doc. I keep saying that.”

  “You’re okay. With five stitches in the back of your head and a lump like a tennis ball. Yeah.”

  “Got the best doctor in the state taking care of me.” When he brushed her hair back from her forehead, her hand closed gently on him, and he flexed his hips with a groan. She licked the head of his cock, and he had trouble keeping his eyes open.

  She was on her knees at his feet. He needed her. But even so close to him, he thought he could feel her holding back from him, and he didn’t like it. He took a step back, and her hand fell away. “I don’t want you giving me head, Tasha. I want to fuck you. I want you to feel me so deep inside, you won’t think I could ever leave. I want to feel your ass in my hands. Your tits in my mouth. I want to feel you wet me while I’m as far in you as I can get. I want to smell you come.”

  Staring up at him, her eyes wide, she swallowed. He heard the click in her throat. “You’re scaring me.”

  He bent down and took her elbows, pulling her to stand before him. Her pants were smooth at the front, so he snagged a finger into her waistband and traced it around until he found the top of a zipper along the side of her hip. “Why would that scare you? You like to get fucked.” He pulled the zipper down, and her pants dropped immediately to the floor. Convenient.

  She was wearing a blue lace thong that matched her bra, and now she was standing there like a lingerie model, looking fair and perfect.

  When he hooked his hand around her neck to bring her close for a kiss, she held back. “You’re changing the rules. I can feel you changing the rules.”

  “Baby, I’m an outlaw. Remember?” He brought her in and laid his other hand on her belly, inside her thong, caressing the sensitive skin from her side to her pussy, her slender swath of trimmed, golden-red hair tickling his palm. He’d discovered early that light touch on the skin from her hip bones to just under her navel was a nearly foolproof way to get her going, and now he felt her skin quivering under his calloused fingertips.

  Pushing his hand between her legs so that he could cup her drenched pussy in his palm, he leaned away a little and opened the nightstand drawer. She kept some of her toys in that drawer. He was interested in trying out several of them with her. But now, he had something specific in mind.

  He pulled a pair of leather cuffs out—the ones he’d found in her bed the first night. He heard her intake of breath, and he felt his palm moisten even more as it held her mound.

  Why he’d been suddenly overtaken with the need to bind her, his head hurt too much to work through all the way. But he was sharp enough, self-aware enough even now, to understand that it had something to do with being hauled in and cuffed for hours himself. It had to do with the party he’d come in on, and the way those people had some kind of claim on Tasha, the way they knew her better than he did, the way she was holding herself back from him.

  It had to do with the image he had now in his head of her lying under him, stretched long and made docile. His.

  Holding them up by one cuff, grinning, he turned back to her. “Trust me enough yet?”

  “Len, your head.” Her voice was barely more than breath.

  “You let me worry about my head. I asked you a question. Do you?”

  After a beat, she nodded.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  He was hurt and drunk—too drunk for how much whiskey he’d had. His tolerance was normally very high, which made her certain about that concussion. And he was freaking her out, saying things to her that were wonderful and terrifying and out of their bounds. Tasha knew she should step back, away from him, and get him into bed. For rest. Because he was injured and not in his right mind.

  But he was standing there, grinning at her, dangling her leather cuffs from his fingers like a prize, and the thought of being bound by him, subject to him, made her pussy throb and soak. And he knew it; his hand between her legs flexed with every pulse of her arousal.

  So she nodded.

  With a flick of his wrist, he tossed the cuffs to the bed, and then he was on her, his fingers snarling in her hair, his mouth insistent on hers, his arms clasping her to him as if she might slip away. But she wasn’t going anywhere. She gave herself to him completely, opening her mouth for his rough demand, wrapping her arms around his neck, savoring the press of his cock on her belly. His hands slid down her back and grabbed her ass, and she whimpered into his mouth. His fingers tightened in response.

  Too much, too much, too much. What they were doing, what he’d said, what she was feeling was too much, too fast. He was undoing everything that she understood about her life, all the ways she’d made it so it made sense and was safe.

  And she was letting him.

  As that rational—what it rational?—thought intruded, she yanked her head away from his with a gasp. “Len!”

  He was breathless, and his eyes lased into hers, but he said nothing.

  “I…” The words died in her head.

  “Shut up, Doc.” In the heavy gravel that was his voice, the words sounded even more demanding, almost like a threat. Moving his hands from her ass to her waist, he gripped her hard and lifted her off the ground. He dropped her onto the bed, her head pointing toward the foot. At first, this confused her, but he straddled her and hooked his hands under her arms, pulling her more at an angle, and she understood. He meant to cuff her to the bed, around one of the posts at the bottom corners. The headboard would have prevented that up top. That he’d worked out the positioning so quickly indicated to Tasha that he’d thought about this before.

  She liked being cuffed. But she’d never been cuffed to the bed. There was not a lot of chain between each of these cuffs. When she’d worn them before, she’d had her hands behind her back—being taken from behind that way was particularly nice. She’d been bound spread to the bed with silk cords once, her arms wide. That she hadn’t liked—she’d felt too vulnerable, bound to something she couldn’t move. Trapped. Truly hel
pless.

  He’d lain down on top of her and had taken her mouth again. As his lips, teeth, and tongue overwhelmed her, robbing her of speech, he pushed her arms over her head, and she grabbed handfuls of the velvet draperies gathered there. His hands left her arms with a pat that she knew meant she should stay put. But when she heard him pick up the cuffs, the chain tinkling, she brought her arms back down and wedged her hands against his chest.

  It took a moment of struggle, but she got her mouth free of his. “Len, no! Not to the bed.” She was out of breath and afraid, and it made her feel dizzy. Blinking a few times, she made her head clear and saw him staring down at her with the same intensity.

  “I don’t…what?”

  “Behind my back. That’s how I like it.”

  He sat back on his heels with a jerk, the cuffs clutched in his fist. “No.”

  She didn’t understand why he was having qualms about the way she wanted to be bound. “What? Why not?”

  “I won’t. No way.”

  “Len, I don’t…I don’t want to be bound to the bed. It’s too much.”

  “Why? You think I’ll leave you there?”

  She didn’t, not really, but she supposed that kind of worry was at the root of it. Not wanting to say so, she didn’t answer.

  “Fuck, Tasha. You gotta trust me.”

  “I do.”

  “Then show it. Trust me. You want me to do shit that is way out of bounds for me. You laid all these rules on us, and I’m goin’ with it. You need to trust me. You want me in a bed with another guy, then you need to give me something.”

  Realizing that they were involved in another negotiation, she calmed down a little. “Are you saying you’re ready to try a threesome with another man?”

  “Foursome. With another chick, too. And not with that fucking Carter asswipe. I pick the guy. A brother.”

  God—he wanted to put her in bed with another Horde? “What? No way.”